For some reason, several blogs are writing stories about how Blu-ray player prices have risen since the demise of HD DVD. This is ridiculous. The information is gathered from PriceGrabber.com for the story.

Let’s look at this for a minute. It’s being reported that the average cost of the Sony BDP-S300 is $405. This is above MSRP, set by Sony at $399. One retailer lists it for $445 (above the list price), and the rest are at MSRP or below. This is throwing off the average.

We also have to consider that many retailers on PriceGrabber are not authorized retailers for the product they’re selling. Authorized retailers (Circuit City, Crutchfield, Best Buy, etc.) list the Sony player at MSRP of $399 – as is correct. No Blu-ray player manufacturer has increased the MSRP of their players.

If retailers were selling below retail previously (and authorized ones do not or they will lose their relationship with the company), it was not do to competition against HD DVD. These retailers weren’t on the Blu-ray side trying to compete against Toshiba, they were also selling Toshiba players. Competition between formats would have been championed by the manufacturers, and they did not just now raise their list price. The MSRP now is the same as the beginning of the year.

Consider this my civic duty, exposing the fraud put out on blogs to stir up controversy and gain hits for their advertisers.